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TRENTON - Statement of Jennifer Kim, NJPIRG State Director, on the FDA’s proposed new rules for food safety:

“After a one-year delay, the FDA finally released two vital food safety rules that will help protect New Jersey consumers from unsafe and contaminated food. The proposed rules will improve the safety of produce and establish better preventative controls and practices in food manufacturing.

“The lengthy delay of these rules has allowed our nation’s food safety problems to continue unchecked. Every year there are an estimated 48 million illnesses, 127,000 hospitalizations and 3,000 deaths caused by food contamination — costing us more than $70 billion annually in health related expenses. Strong and prompt implementation of these new rules will help to finally bring those numbers down and give consumers the safe food supply they deserve.

“Still, the FDA has failed to release five additional long-overdue rules to improve food safety. We will continue to advocate for release of the other rules, so that no American lives are at risk from unsafe food.”

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NJPIRG, the New Jersey Public Interest Research Group, is a non-profit, non-partisan public interest advocacy organization that takes on powerful interests on behalf of its members, working to win concrete results for New Jerseyans’ health and well-being.